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Security tight for embassy bombing sentencing

Mohamed

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Security will be tighter than usual at the U.S. District Courthouse in Manhattan for Thursday's sentencing of four men convicted in the only U.S. trial to date against followers of suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden.

Three of the men were found guilty in May of having a hands-on role in the suicide truck bombings of two American embassies in East Africa on August 7, 1998. The fourth man was a longtime aide to Saudi exile bin Laden. The nearly simultaneous embassy attacks killed 224 people, including 12 Americans, and injured another 4,500.

The courthouse is only blocks from where the World Trade Center used to stand. There will be additional checkpoints and more U.S. marshals outside the courthouse, and pedestrian access around the block has been restricted.

U.S. officials believe bin Laden masterminded the September 11 attacks that brought down the World Trade Center. Mohamed al-'Owhali, a 24-year-old Saudi, and Mohamed Odeh, a 36-year-old Jordanian, were found guilty of carrying out the first blast in Nairobi, Kenya, and murdering the 213 people who died in it.

Trial evidence and testimony showed al-'Owhali rode in the bomb truck and fired stun grenades at embassy security guards to maneuver the truck closer to the targeted building. Odeh was a technical adviser to the bombing and an admitted soldier in bin Laden's radical Islamic militant group, al Qaeda.

Khalfan Khamis Mohamed, a 28-year-old Tanzanian, was found guilty of carrying out the second blast, in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and murdering the 11 people who died there. Mohamed rented the house where the Tanzania bomb was assembled and ground TNT for the explosive device.

Federal prosecutors sought the death penalty against al-'Owhali and Mohamed, but the jury rejected executions for the two men in separate penalty proceedings for each. The jury's cited reasons for opposing capital punishment included the fear that it would turn the bombers into martyrs and further their terrorist cause. The jury also stated the view that life in prison would be a harsher punishment than death by lethal injection.

U.S. District Judge Leonard Sand has no choice but to sentence al-'Owhali and Mohamed to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Sand will almost certainly sentence Odeh to life in prison as well -- the statutory penalty dictated by the murder counts.

al-'Owhali

Sand has more flexibility with the fourth man convicted -- Wadih el Hage, a 41-year-old naturalized American of Lebanese descent, who faces from 30 years to life behind bars. El Hage, who was a personal secretary to bin Laden when his organization was based in Sudan in the early 1990s, later became a key facilitator of his East Africa cell, sending and receiving messages for the leaders in Afghanistan.

Trial evidence also showed that el Hage used a charity to receive money from bin Laden and to manufacture fake identification cards for his operatives. But el Hage had left Kenya a year before the bombings and was never accused of having a direct role in the attacks.

Like the others, el Hage stands convicted of joining the terrorism conspiracy to kill Americans and to destroy U.S. property. El Hage was also convicted of multiple counts of perjury for lying to cover up his role. His attorneys hope that Sand will impose less than a life sentence.

"Here's a guy that does not have a history of violence -- was alleged to have carried out logistical tasks. He was not involved in the bombings himself, and there was nothing in evidence that he knew about the bombings," said attorney Joshua Dratel.

Unlike the three other defendants, el Hage has not been convicted of murder or any violent acts.

"A life sentence was sufficient for them, it seems disproportionate to give our client the same sentence," Dratel says.

The three bombers -- al-'Owhali, Odeh, and Mohamed -- all trained at al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan during the 1990s. Odeh was among the al Qaeda operatives who offered military training to Somali tribes opposed to a U.S. troop presence in Somalia in 1993.

Bin Laden was the absent lead defendant, one of 13 indicted fugitives in the case, but a strong presence in the courtroom. His religious decrees, or fatwahs, declaring war on the U.S. and threatening to kill American soldiers and civilians were prime prosecution evidence.

None of the defendants testified during the trial. Only two of them -- Odeh and el Hage -- are expected to speak at their sentencing, according to attorneys.